The present system relates to cellular telephones, and specifically to selection between different modes, i.e., data, fax, and voice, in such a cellular telephone.
The IS-95 standard permits receiving data, fax, and voice transmissions over the cellular system. More generally, the incoming call can be selected as being one of several modes. The receiver, e.g. the cell phone, can then send the incoming call to an attached fax machine, for example, if the incoming call is a fax.
However, certain networks, such as the current Sprint(trademark) network, do not actually support the protocol indicated the way it was originally intended. In these certain networks, all calls are handled as voice. Operations must be prearranged. The handset that is to receive the call must be manually put in a special mode where it ignores the network instructions. This forces the call to take the selected mode. Therefore, for example, if the incoming call is a fax, the call is routed to a fax machine which receives and decodes the specific fax.
The problem, of course, is that this requires a priori knowledge of what calls are coming in. Moreover, once the telephone is put into its specific mode, the user must remember to remove the telephone from that specific mode, or else the next call will be erroneously answered as a fax.
The present system describes a dynamic menu that can operate on a system where system-based control of the mode of the incoming call is not possible. According to this system, the user can select a mode of the incoming call from a menu which is dynamically-produced in the handset. This allows the user to select a desired target when the call first comes in.
The dynamic menu can also be used to allow the user to change the mode of the call, for example, in mid-call, to change to a modem or fax operation for a manual-driven fax. If the user answers by mistake, the user can be used to manually change to fax or data mode using the dynamic menu. Accordingly, this system gives the user the option, in a system which does not support automated switching between modes, to still answer a phone in one of multiple modes without having to prearrange the operation.